Hey everybody,

I'm currently in talks with the seller of a pool service & repair biz in my local area. It's a company that's serviced my in-law's house for the past 15 years so there's a relationship and some foundational trust. I'm at the stage where I'm ready to get an LOI to him, but I'm still deciding which route I want to go with professional help.

If you've spent any time around ETA twitter, you'll start to think you need to spend $~20k on a lawyer, a buy-side broker, and a due diligence/QoE firm EACH. Then again I've seen some posts on SF that say they got the whole multi-million dollar deal done for under $5k. How does one do a proper, comprehensive acquisition without running up a massive bill of professional fees?

I spoke to one broker who charges about ~20k only if the deal closes, and they said they have a network of professionals who can do QoE stuff by the hour, so it wouldn't be a large $20k QoE bill as well. That seems like a decent option, but then I'm still paying $20k for the broker, and $20k for the lawyer + hourly for QoE.

Anyone have a fantastic experience they can recommend for knocking all this out in a more affordable way? (FWIW I'm in northern California)